If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Trip-Gate, despicable, but was it planned or even ordered?

League should take closer look at Alosi phalanx
Posted by Mike Florio on December 13, 2010, 2:19 PM EST
The widespread presumption in the wake of Sunday’s tripping incident by Jets strength coach Sal Alosi is that Alosi acted alone, a rogue rah-rah guy who had a little too much Rex Ryan and/or Red Bull before the game.

But look at the video and/or the still image. Alosi appears to be the first man in phalanx of six sweat-suited soldiers who were lined up like soccer players bracing for a kick.

If Alosi truly opted to throw his knee into the path of Dolphins gunner Nolan Carroll on his own, it possibly didn’t happen because Alosi caught a wild hair but because Alosi and others had been coached by someone to provide an impediment to the gunner. And that makes whoever decided to put Alosi and others in that way partially responsible for Alosi’s apparent decision to be more active than passive in impeding Carroll’s progress.

For now, we’re not saying whether anyone is or should be responsible beyond Alosi. But we think that the league should look into whether the Jets routinely deploy the Alosi alignment.

And when Alosi meets with the media today at 2:30 p.m. ET, he fairly should be grilled about why it was that he and five other identically-clad employees were standing foot to foot during an opponents’ punt.

We doubt that it was a coincidence.

The Jets were standing as far down the sidelines as allowed, to the last inch.

Note the blue line. As far as I know, that indicates the furthest spot that sideline personnel are allowed to stand.

I heard a WFAN caller (the infamous incarcerated bob) claim that two Jets players said that the Jets were angry that the Dolphins gunner had been going out of bounds during kickoffs, and that this formation was done to stop that.

Should they have been there?

From the NFL Rulebook:

Rule 13, Article 5 Coaches and other non-participating team personnel (including uniformed players not in the game at the time) are prohibited from moving laterally along the sidelines any further than the points that are 18 yards from the middle of the bench area (i.e., 32-yard lines to left and right of bench areas when benches are placed on opposite sides of the field). Lateral movement within the bench area must be behind the solid six-foot white border.

So, Jets strength coach Sal Alosi and his cronies (practice squad players?) were standing the zone marked for “Coaches and substitution players only” and they were lined up as close to the edge – both to the playing field and edge of the bench area zone as humanly possible.

Definitely a planned lineup, no? Who had them do this?

I don’t think the plan was for Alosi to stick his knee out and knock the player down, but he was put into that position. By whom?

After the game, Rex Ryan professed to be unaware of the situation until the team’s director of media operations informed him.

So many questions here.

•Did Rex Ryan order this formation?
•Is it common to do this?
•Do other teams do it?
•Is it only a big deal because Alosi stupidly stuck his knee out?
•Is this rule even enforced?
What Alosi did was a penalty:

Palpably Unfair Act (Non-Player)
Rule 13, Section 1, Article 8

Article 8 Non-player personnel of a club (e.g., management personnel, coaches, trainers, equipment men) are prohibited from making unnecessary physical contact with or directing abusive, threatening, or insulting language or gestures at opponents, game officials, or representatives of the League.

Penalty: Loss of 15 yards. (Unsportsmanlike conduct.) Enforcement is from:
a) succeeding spot if the ball is dead;
b) previous spot if the ball was in play; or
c) whatever spot the spot Referee, after consulting with the crew, deems equitable.

Should it be more?

The poster "pacertom" since this forum began (and before!). I changed my name here to "Slick Pinkham" in honor of the imaginary player That Bobby "Slick" Leonard picked late in the 1971 ABA draft (true story!).

Re: Trip-Gate, despicable, but was it planned or even ordered?

I think they were lined up 3 feet in front of where they were suppose to be. The solid white border looks like 3 feet in the picture instead of 6 feet.

Anyway it goes the NFL doesn't enforce all the rules all the time. IMO the guy shouldn't lose his job for doing this. This story is way overblown.

I disagree 100%.

Not only was it wrong, it was plain stupid.

1. There are a bazillion cameras around at modern day NFL games

2. He is the S+C coach. Lord Forbid the guy have a season or career ending injury.

I am all for second and third chances, but I am glad he was suspended. They probably could have just hit him with a month suspension (because he gets paid every 2 weeks) but I feel no pity for him for being out of work and a paycheck for the remainder of the season and playoffs.

2. He is the S+C coach. Lord Forbid the guy have a season or career ending injury.

I am all for second and third chances, but I am glad he was suspended. They probably could have just hit him with a month suspension (because he gets paid every 2 weeks) but I feel no pity for him for being out of work and a paycheck for the remainder of the season and playoffs.

Oh I am by no means justifying what he did and I do think he should be suspended but calling for a mans job is a bit much to me. This is especailly true if he was told by someone to do it.

I just hate how if anyone makes a mistake now the media wants them fired.

Re: Trip-Gate, despicable, but was it planned or even ordered?

Oh I am by no means justifying what he did and I do think he should be suspended but calling for a mans job is a bit much to me. This is especailly true if he was told by someone to do it.

I just hate how if anyone makes a mistake now the media wants them fired.

I don't have any great "moral outrage" about it. I don't think he's a terrible person, necessarily. But in an environment with 10% unemployment, where there are 100's of qualified trainers and other professionals who would fight for his job, why shouldn't he be fired?

If you can easily find a similarly qualified individual who hasn't acted like a bone-head, shouldn't you hire THAT person?

Re: Trip-Gate, despicable, but was it planned or even ordered?

I don't have any great "moral outrage" about it. I don't think he's a terrible person, necessarily. But in an environment with 10% unemployment, where there are 100's of qualified trainers and other professionals who would fight for his job, why shouldn't he be fired?

If you can easily find a similarly qualified individual who hasn't acted like a bone-head, shouldn't you hire THAT person?

Are you a S + C coach who is looking for work.

The whole idea of those guys being so close is to disrupt the player. If the coach wants him to be disruptive then I have hard time saying that he should be fired for carring out what the coach wants.

The reason why he has that job is because he knows someone anyway. ITs not like the Jets are taking apps for S+C coaches.

Re: Trip-Gate, despicable, but was it planned or even ordered?

I don't think anyone asked anybody to stick out a knee to trip someone. That was likely a spontaneous boneheaded decision.

It is crytal clear though that these guys are standing "in formation" ready to take a hit if the gunner was a half-inch across the white line. It seems like such a formation isn't illegal and the NFL will have no further discipline. There are reasons why the tactic would be useful: a player can't throw a legal block out of bounds, while the guy being blocked can use the out of bounds area to run around the blocking player. This was a trick invented by the special teams great Steve Tasker of the Bills.

It still seems odd and frankly wrong to line up a group of inactive players and coaches to be "enforcers" should the gunner stray too far off the line.

My guess is that the Jets blocker was supposed to shove the gunner out of bounds hard enough to go into these guys and they would make sure he was tangled up enough not to be able to get in on the play. Legal, and dirty.

The poster "pacertom" since this forum began (and before!). I changed my name here to "Slick Pinkham" in honor of the imaginary player That Bobby "Slick" Leonard picked late in the 1971 ABA draft (true story!).

Re: Trip-Gate, despicable, but was it planned or even ordered?

The New York Jets have suspended Sal Alosi indefinitely after the team got "new information" that the strength and conditioning coach "instructed" five players to stand in a wall before he tripped Dolphins player Nolan Carroll on Sunday.

Jets general manager Mike Tannenbaum announced the punishment after Alosi was suspended for the rest of the season and fined $25,000 on Monday.

"Over the last day as we continued our investigation we discovered some new information," Tannenbaum said. "The players at the Miami game were instructed by Sal to stand where they were forcing the gunner in the game to run around them. Based on that new information we've suspended Sal indefinitely, pending further review."
This isn't the first time that Alosi has ordered players to line up, according to a player who was in the line.